


The Misadventures of the Apartment 303-4

by Mad Cap (a_kline)



Series: The Misadventures of the Apartment 303-4 [1]
Category: Community (TV)
Genre: F/F, F/M, M/M
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2013-03-02
Updated: 2013-05-16
Packaged: 2017-12-04 01:26:19
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 10
Words: 5,326
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/704899
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/a_kline/pseuds/Mad%20Cap
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>A series of shorts set in a brighter timeline for season four that involves Britta, Annie, Troy, and Abed living together in one apartment. Jeff gets called in as mediator far more than he likes, Shirley bakes for the group of four far more than Jeff likes, and Pierce might be dead; they're not really sure on that one. Britta asked, "What could possibly go wrong?" right before moving in, and I'm writing the chronicles of how that question Britta-ed this timeline. But in the best way possible, of course.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Awesome Advances in Applied Affairs

**Author's Note:**

> This is a continuous universe where the shorts will overlap, but each piece can also stand on its own.

“So long story short–”

“You can’t say that after a twenty minute explanation.”

“-we couldn’t have fit any more in if we’d tried!”

Jeff looked mildly skeptical as he swigged some beer. “But how did Abed even get the clear toaster? They don’t sell anything like that at the Bed, Bath, and Beyond here.”

Britta peered over the rim of her bottle at Jeff with a smirk. “What exactly _is_ beyond the bed and bath?”

“Clearly not clear toasters!”

“Jeff, listen, you’re missing the whole point of this story. Annie fit _twenty_ Bagel Bites into just one side! I took some really fantastic pictures of them as they were cooking,” Britta gushed.

“You’re girl-crush boner is showing,” Jeff said.

“Said the guy who made out with her as a teenager,” Britta responded.

“Said the girl who made out with her as a twenty-one year old,” Jeff said casually.

“Said the – _wait_ , she told you?”

“Ah-ha! Called it! God I’m good,” Jeff sang as he dodged a flying cashew. “Pierce wanted to put a bet on how long it would take you to turn Annie into a lesbian after moving into the apartment with them.”

“And you went along with that?” Britta cried out in a rage.

“No! Geez. Calm down, you spaz. I just meant I knew this would happen. It’s cool though. Really. And hot. Mildly upsetting, granted, but mostly hot.”

Britta studied Jeff intently with a firm glare to judge his honesty. As tempted as she was  to yell at him about objectifying her and Annie, she refrained. Seemingly pleased, Britta leaned back in her chair.

There was a comfortable pause.

“Troy fit twenty four into the other side of the toaster.”

Jeff leaned forward in interest and asked, “Do you have the pictures?”

“They’re still in the darkroom but they’re developed. Oh, speaking of, will you help me take the darkroom down before they get home and need to use the bathroom?”

“Yeah, sure. Hey, so, how many boxes of Bagel Bites do those guys go through in a week? I have a bet going with Shirley.”


	2. Broken Brains with Breaded Bounty

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> A fortune cookie wrinkles Abed's brain.

“Jeff, are you listening? This is critical information and I need your help with it.”

“No, yeah, I’m totally listening, Abed. This is my listening face.”

Abed shook his head. “No. That’s the face you make when there’s no hot girl in the room and you’re reminded of how bad you are at socializing with guys,” Abed stated.

“What the hell? I am _so_ not bad at socializing with guys. There…just… aren't any guys that are on my level of coolness,” Jeff clarified. “Except you of course, Abed. Kind of. When you're not quoting me into oblivion, at least.”

“Excellent. Then you’ll help me figure this problem out.” Abed stared pointedly at the fortune cookie that sat ominously between them on the wooden table; split open and hard as a rock, the cookie was the messenger that Abed had shot.

“You know they print those at random in a factory, right? There are no actual Chinese mystic powers in them,” Jeff said while tucking his phone into his jacket pocket. He still didn't understand why Abed had called him over at seven a.m. on a Saturday. “And where is everyone else?”

“Donut run,” Abed clarified, eyes still on the cookie as he added, “I had to get them out of the apartment while I figured this out. _‘Love has entered your home and will bring you much fortune and luck.’_ But what love? Troy and Britta broke up months ago, no new Batman memorabilia has been purchased, and Annie hasn't been planning any weddings that I know of.”

Jeff bit back a shit-eating grin. “My guess is as good as yours, Abed. Maybe it’s a prediction for the future.”

Abed had opened his mouth to tell Jeff why he was wrong when the front door opened and three people fell through it almost simultaneously.

“We brought donuts,” Troy announced with joy. “Oh, hey Jeff!”

“Hey Troy.”

“Guess what else,” Annie said happily before pausing to throw Britta a wide smile and continuing, “I tripped over a curb and almost dropped all of the donuts onto the street. But at the last minute Britta caught me! What luck, right?”

“Speaking of luck…” Britta started. She rifled through her sweatshirt pocket before pulling out a five dollar bill and holding it up. “I found this on the ground right after I helped Annie back up. Small fortune, I know, but it’s still _pretty_ exciting.”

“And I didn’t eat _any_ of the donuts on the way home,” Troy said proudly.

Too busy with patting Troy on the back, no one noticed Abed clutching the small fortune tightly and with wide eyes.


	3. Counseling on Creepy Crawlers

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Troy doesn't believe in any of this stuff, anyway.

Troy sat rigidly at the dinner table. Every sound made him flinch, jump, or perform a weird and embarrassing combination of the two. So it was reasonable that when Annie came home and shut the door too loudly that Troy started to cry.

“Whoa, hey now,” Annie soothed quickly, “What’s going on? Did Britta forget to leave the front light on for when you got home?”

She shed her coat and took the seat across from Troy. It was worrying to see him look so terrified; Annie would never admit it but she made Britta leave the front light on for her too when she knew she’d be home first and alone.

“No, no she did,” Troy said. He breathed in deeply and squeezed Annie’s hand gratefully. “Jeff wouldn’t come when I called.”

“He had a hair appointment,” Annie responded in understanding. “But I’m here now! What’s going on?”

Troy looked around nervously. The shadow between the two recliners suddenly looked very human-like, and there was a distinct scraping sound coming from Britta’s room. Had Mary come for him? “I, uh, had an interesting conversation with the landlord today in the hall,” Troy said cautiously. He didn’t want to reveal too much too soon and scare Annie as well.

“Rick?” Annie questioned. “He didn’t try and sell you back my shoes again, did he?”

“No, nothing like that,” Troy said. “He asked me if we’d had any weird goings-on since Britta moved in.”

“Goings-on? Isn’t it ‘going-ons’?”

“No, it’s definitely ‘goings-on’. I looked it up like an hour ago.”

“Huh. Continue.”

Troy leaned forward and Annie mirrored his position. He said, “Rick told me that Britta’s room used to belong to his last tenant's mother.” Seeing that Annie still wasn’t catching on, he added sorrowfully, “And she died in there.”

“Oh my God!” Annie cried. She quickly sat back and covered her mouth with her hand.

After a moment of hesitation, the both of them turned to look towards the closed bedroom door. Another scraping sound was vaguely heard from it. Annie turned back to Troy and tried to casually scoff. “I mean,” she said uncertainly, “you don’t think it’s like, haunted or anything, do you?”

“Pft, ha, ha,” Troy shot back with as much uncertainty, “No way! I just thought someone else should, you know, know about it. That’s all. It’s cool though.”

“Totally,” Annie added quickly.

Moments after expressing their uncertain certainties, both of them nervously looked back at the door.


	4. Deliciousness of Denying Decorum

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> There are probably a lot of things that Britta doesn't know.

Britta sat at the table with her head on her folded arms. Her face, hidden from view, had taken on a dramatically depressing expression of sadness.

Annie sat across from her. Her fingers were laced together and she had been staring worriedly at Britta for the past five minutes.

Jeff sat at the head of the table. He finally slammed down his phone and gestured angrily. “Will either one of you _please_ tell me why you two dragged me here at three in the damn morning?”

Annie pursed her lips in thought. After seeing that Britta wasn’t going to make any other sound besides heavy groaning, she turned her stare onto Jeff and sighed. “Britta, well, er... _consumed_ meat unknowingly and has been… _upset_ , ever since,” she explained in a quiet tone.

“How in the hell do you accidentally eat meat? Did you slip and fall on a rib-eye?” Jeff asked. It was that moment that he seriously considered the repercussions of changing his phone number and not telling any of them.

“Jeff! Come on,” Annie chastised. She reached across the table and squeezed Britta’s hand in solidarity but then quickly withdrew it. Ignoring the fact that Jeff’s features brightened measurably at that gesture, Annie pushed on. “Shirley tried out a new recipe earlier today and her sons didn’t enjoy it. I'm going to assume Andre didn't as well. Regardless, she stormed over here in a huff and since Britta was the only one home at the time she gave it to her so it wouldn’t go to waste.”

“Baking still isn’t an identifier,” Jeff grumbled.

“Shirley assured Britta that it was meat-free,” Annie said, ignoring Jeff again, “and so Britta ate it. Hours later –”

“I was still listening to this idiotic story.”

“-Britta was mad because Abed left rib bones in the trash. She was in the middle of lecturing him on animal rights when he pointed out she was being a bit hypocritical because she had gravy sauce on her shirt.”

An eery and temporary silence fell.

Jeff turned to Britta and tried to find her eyes. “Gravy? That’s what this is about? I had to cut my beauty rest short because of _gravy_?”

“I didn’t know it was made from meat,” Britta finally cried out.

“Didn’t you ever watch your mom cook when you were little?” Annie asked with furrowed brows.

Britta’s head shot up and she scoffed. “Oh, please. I refused to stay in the kitchen. That’s like feminism 101, duh-doy.”

“No,” Jeff said angrily, “‘Duh-doy’ is you not knowing gravy was made from meat! Where in the hell did you think it came from?”

“A can!” Britta yelled. She stood up abruptly and slammed her hands onto the table. “A can! I thought it came from a can! I thought all food came from a can until I was fifteen, okay? Stop judging me!”

Britta sped to her room and the door slammed behind her.

Jeff wasted no time in pulling on his coat, but he left one last word of wisdom for Annie: “Since you’re her girlfriend now, it’s your job to show her not everything comes out of a can.” Annie’s jaw dropped and she made her most high pitch affronted gasp, but Jeff had already made it to the front door by then.

"Rude."

"I agree," Troy and Abed said from inside their bedroom blanket fort.

"Even more rude!" Annie shouted back. She always forgot they didn't have walls. Or a door. Ugh, boys.

 


	5. Effective Enjoyment of Erratic Evasion

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Shirley might not be invited back anytime soon.

“I had been watching them quarreling through the window.”

“Well that doesn’t seem right!”

“Don’t encourage him, Shirley,” Jeff said while obviously irked.

“Jeffrey,” Shirley chastised, “Abed called us over because he needs our help! Don’t be a jerk. Continue, Abed.”

“Thank you, Shirley,” Abed said gratefully. He took a moment to gather his thoughts before continuing; his voice has taken on a dramatic quality when he said: “It was a Wednesday evening. The air smelled crisp, like the sun was crackling down on us in amusement.”

“That doesn’t even make sense."

“And I had on a red shirt. Annie wore orange…Britta wore blue. I remember that because I thought it was fitting that they were in contrasting colors. I was out on the fire escape when I heard the first yell from Britta. She was losing her cool, and quickly.”

Jeff scoffed. “Britta never had ‘cool’ to lose.”

Abed seemed unfazed by Jeff’s constant interruptions, but Shirley kicked him under the table. She was intrigued, and wary. She also wondered if Andre had remembered to take her pie out of the oven when the timer had gone off. That thought increased her wariness exponentially and she had temporarily tuned Abed out.

“-and I stood as close as I could get to the window without them seeing me. That’s when I heard Britta ask Annie if she was ashamed.” At hearing this Jeff perked up. “When Annie didn’t answer, Britta seemed shocked. At least, that’s how I interpreted her sudden silence. Anyway, she said ‘Oh, I get it’ before picking up her sweatshirt and leaving Annie’s room. When the door slammed shut Annie looked like she was going to go after her, but then she stopped herself. Told herself it wasn’t a good idea, you see? Said it was for the best,” Abed finished as he stared off into space.

The three of them sat at the kitchen table for an extended amount of time. They were quiet, pondering, and even Jeff looked a tad taken aback. He was the first to break the silence.

“Where’s Britta now?”

Abed shook his head and answered, “I don’t know. Troy went out to look for her a while ago but ended up calling from the Mexican restaurant down the street.”

Silence again fell over the table. Shirley held the cross on her necklace tightly and shook her head every now and then. Jeff texted Britta knowing he wouldn’t get a response. Damn woman was ten miles high on her own drama again.

Abed pulled a toothpick out of thin air and started chewing on it. His eyes narrowed. It was time he started paying more attention to how Annie and Britta acted around each other. He'd been too preoccupied lately with how much older Pierce was looking and how often Shirley would make excuses to leave early to spend time with her family. Troy was also acting odd around him, but only subtley. He had the sinking feeling that damn fortune cookie had something to do with all of this.

Shirley broke the extended and uncomfortable silence. “Anyone want me to bake something while we wait for Britta and/or Troy to get back?”

Jeff almost threw his phone across the room.


	6. Fractional Fiction in Fake Forensics

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Abed underestimates Troy, and Troy underestimates Abed. And no one calls Jeff.

“Where’s the romance, huh? That’s what I’d like to know!” Troy threw off his apron in a huff.

Abed was at a loss. He had categorized everything Troy had ever said to him in an internal database that could never be either corrupted or deleted. But this? This was new, and this was not something that Abed understood, although it seemed vaguely familiar.

“I slaved all day over a hot microwave oven and went out of my way to buy your favorite soda, and this is the thanks I get? You don’t _remember_ what day it is?”

Ah, sitcom. The pieces finally fell into place and Abed knew he’d forgotten either an important anniversary or a prearranged date. This he could handle, but what he still didn’t understand was that, at least to his knowledge, he and Troy weren’t in a romantic relationship. He didn’t think he’d miss something _that_ huge.

“I think I understand why you’re angry,” Abed started. He took off his jacket and approached Troy in the kitchen. “But I’m unsure about how to fix this. Is this where I guess what anniversary today is?”

Troy had his hands on his hips and was shaking his head. “I can’t believe you, Abed. This is so typical.”

“It’s really not,” Abed stated. “In fact it’s so implausible that…it can’t be real. This is a hoax. You’re messing with me, aren’t you?”

It only took a few seconds for Troy’s laughter to erupt out of him and for his angry posterior to crack. “I am! Oh man, I got you so good, man. Remember when we were watching that Flintstones episode last night and you were like, ‘How could Fred forget their anniversary every year?’ and I was like, ‘I don’t know, but how awesome would it be if we had a pet dinosaur?’”

Abed nodded absently as he walked past Troy and took in all of the food Troy had actually prepared.

“Yeah, well, that gave me this idea. I knew the look on your face would be priceless, and it was! I can’t wait to tell Jeff about this,” Troy gushed. “Man, I’m funny.”

“But you really made all of this food for me,” Abed pointed out. He looked thoughtful and that made Troy slightly uneasy.

“Well, yeah. I mean there is no ‘try’ in practical jokes. You either do or you don’t. Pretty cool, right? And with Britta still MIA and Annie out for the night I figure we can watch some more Flintstones and have a nice dinner. I mean, if that’s cool with you or whatever,” Troy added with a forced nonchalant shrug.

Abed, looking like he’d just figured out something super important, sent Troy a rare and genuine smile. “I appreciate this. I’ll go get the DVD’s and you get out the lap trays so we can eat in the chairs without spilling,” Abed called as he walked away.

Troy smiled once Abed was out of sight. “I am _so_ awesome and smart,” Troy whispered to himself. His plan had gone off without a hitch. Abed didn’t suspect a thing.

 


	7. Great Grievances, Greater Gainsaying

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> It's always chaotic when they break out the superhero costumes, and Jeff misses Britta.

Annie, Abed, and Troy stood shoulder-to-shoulder in the middle of their apartment. Abed, dressed in his Batman costume, clung tightly to his grapple hook. Troy, dressed in his Spiderman pajamas, held an icepack to his right hand. Lastly, Annie, dressed in normal attire, stood with her arms crossed and a firm glare on her face as she looked anywhere but at officer Cackowski.

Jeff stood next to the officer with his arms folded as well. This was not how he had planned to spend his Sunday evening.

“I guess I just don’t understand,” said Cackowski. “Why did you grapple into the landlord’s apartment again, and then why did you punch him?”

“For justice,” Abed said, his voice low and gravely.

“You and Toto aren’t in Gotham anymore, Batman,” Jeff chided.

“Okay, can I just –” Annie started as she stepped forward and shot the boys a look. “We were trying to question Rick to see if he knew the whereabouts of our friend and also the fourth tenant here.”

Cackowski put down his notepad and sighed. “So this is a missing person’s case?”

“She’s not missing,” Jeff said. “I’m pretty sure _Britta_ knows exactly where Britta is, and if she wanted to be found she would come back.”

“Oh, like you’re not worried.”

“What’s to be worried about? She disappears off the grid for months at a time during holiday breaks and you didn’t even seem to notice then. Why do you care now, Annie?” It was funny to Jeff because of course  _he_ knew why Annie was worried, but no one else did. That made it even funnier. Sometimes Jeff's humor knew no bounds. Like his looks. But he was digressing.

“Yeah,” Troy said loudly – the light bulb had gone on. “Why do you care about Britta’s whereabouts so much now, Annie? I mean it was your idea for us to question Rick.”

“ _I_ didn’t tell you to dress up and break into his apartment,” Annie yelled back. “I just wanted to knock on his door like a normal human being!”

“Batman doesn’t play by the rules,” Abed interjected.

“And neither does Spiderman!”

“Those pajamas don’t even fit you anymore,” Jeff mumbled. His face was buried behind his cell phone as he captured a picture of the chaotic scene in front of him. Britta would come back if she knew she was causing chaos and could “fix” everyone by returning.

Stupid Britta. It wasn’t like Jeff missed her or anything. Things were quiet without her around. And dull. Sometimes lame, too. But whatever.

“I’m not here to deal with your usual shenanigans,” officer Cackowski shouted over the arguing. “And Rick isn’t pressing charges despite me trying to get him to. I’d rest a lot easier with this one behind bars,” he finished with a finger pointed at Abed.

“You can never escape me,” Abed started and continued, “Bullets don’t harm me. Nothing harms me. But I know pain…I know pain. Sometimes I share it with someone like you.”

Annie rolled her eyes. “We’re really sorry, officer. Maybe we can try and go all of next month without having to see you.”

Officer Cackowski really hated them.

However, once he had left and everyone had calmed their nerves, Troy turned back to Annie. “You never answered my question. What’s going on with you and Britta?”

Annie scoffed. “What’s going on with you and Abed?”

“Some days you just can’t get rid of a bomb,” Abed mumbled.

“Damn it, Abed. You are not Batman! Wait, what _is_ going on with you and Abed, Troy?”


	8. Hidden Horrors

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Annie misses Britta, and Troy gets to be a man. Nothing is really resolved, but that's okay.

The scratching from Britta’s room woke Troy up. It was the same scratching he’d been hearing for weeks. It had never seemed to bother Britta when she was in the room; then again, maybe Britta had never heard it. Troy pondered this as he snuck out of bed and quietly picked up his quantum spammer.

“Troy.”

“Go back to sleep, Abed. I can handle this.”

“You’re going to hit a ghost with a quantum spammer?”

“I’m going to tell Mary to shut up and stop haunting Britta’s room,” Troy said bravely. He was a man, damn it. 

And then he was in front of Britta’s bedroom door and everything was a lot scarier than it had felt back in his blanket fort. But Troy started taking comfort from Annie’s voice which – wait.

“Go back to sleep, Daniel. It’s okay.”

Troy’s eyes widened. Daniel? Who was Daniel? Annie was sleeping with some guy named Daniel who made scratching noises in Britta’s room? Maybe he should have brought Abed with him.

Another series of scratches, a thump, and a quiet giggle from Annie was enough to completely unnerve Troy. He almost wished it was Mary the ghost instead of this scandal with Annie sneaking some guy in and not telling any of them.

“Who is Daniel and why are you not following house rules by checking him in?” Troy demanded as he barged into the dark room.

Annie sat cross-legged on Britta’s bed and she nearly screamed when the door had slammed open. “What the hell is wrong with you, Troy?”

“Me? What’s wrong with you?” Troy responded. He had one arm covering his eyes so he wouldn’t see anyone’s junk. The other hand was swinging around his fake spammer with no real target in mind. “You’re the one in Britta’s room with some stranger named Daniel,” he stormed.

Annie’s shock faded to a blank and mildly frustrated stare. “Troy, look at me. There is no man in here named Daniel. Are you really telling me you dated Britta for months and don’t know the name of her one-eyed cat?” Annie asked.

Troy dropped his arms and realized he should’ve put on a shirt prior to this entire situation. “She never really mentioned the cat,” he admitted. "Not after Pierce told everyone I thought all cats were girls."

An orange, one-eyed Tabby cat carefully slunk around Annie’s arm and hopped onto the floor. He gave Troy a passive look and walked across the floor to his milk bowl; his claws made the same scratching noise Troy had taken to identifying the apartment ghost with.

But…oh.

“Mary is Daniel,” Troy deduced out loud.

“Britta’s been keeping him a secret from you two because she knew pets weren’t allowed in the apartment,” Annie explained. “She couldn’t bring herself to get rid of him.”

“She really did knit him a little eye patch,” Troy observed. The cat jumped back onto Annie’s lap and looked up at her with one eye before purring.

Annie smiled softly down at him and stroked his chin before he pulled away. “He misses Britta, but he likes me too so it’s okay. Do you think we should tell Abed?”

With a yawn and a nod Troy said, “Yeah, he’ll be cool with it. I’m sure Daniel will prefer being able to roam the apartment or whatever it is that cats do. It’s really cool of you to take care of him like this while Britta’s gone.”

Annie just mumbled an “I owe her” and shrugged it off. She said a good night and expected Troy to leave after, but he didn't.

Troy paused because he had one more question before he headed back to bed. “Annie, how do you know that it’s a boy cat?”


	9. Irrelevant Immorality is Incidental

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Britta comes home. Abed plans to turn everything black and white.

“We wouldn’t be having this problem if you could remember the stupid password!” Troy yelled from underneath Britta’s bed. His legs flailed as Abed attempted to pull him out after a gross misjudgment of the height of the bedframe from the floor.

“Don’t yell at me!” Annie cried out. Her voice cracked and she smacked her hand against the bookshelf housing Britta’s books and vinyl. This was hopeless, and she sort of sucked for forgetting Britta’s laptop password. It wasn’t like she hadn’t typed it in for Britta or used her laptop when they were –

“What are you morons doing and why are you dragging me into it?” Jeff leaned in the bedroom doorway looking like he was on his way to a date. “I have a date in like thirty minutes so you’ll need to make it quick.”

“We’re trying to break into Britta’s laptop to figure out where she went to,” Abed explained. “It's a last ditch effort but I think it has a lot of potential."

"Annie said Britta has the password written on a piece of paper hidden somewhere, but she can’t remember where it is. Or what the password is,” Troy explained further, at that point being only half stuck under the bed. With a final yank Abed got him free.

“Did you try 'activism'?” Jeff suggested.

Annie’s eyes widened. “That’s it! That’s her password! Activism216. I can’t believe I forgot it,” she said as an afterthought.

“What’s the 216 stand for?” Troy asked.

That’s when the bomb went off and they all died.

At least, that’s what Annie sort of wished would have happened. Instead, her eyes widened as they were prone to do in critical moments. The three boys stared at her in expectation and some mild confusion. It had been thirty seconds since the question was asked.

Then a minute had passed. The room was becoming unbearably awkward.

When the stare down didn’t seem to be coming to an end Annie took evasive measures. She stretched the last syllable of an “uhm” for so long that she broke a personal record and hit a note so high that she made herself wince.

“And on that note,” Jeff said a moment later. He turned on his heel and left the apartment with the mental note to never come back. Ever. Not even if Abed tricked him into coming back, either. And he would also never admit to how many times that had happened.

"Jeff is a fantastic plot device sometimes," Abed remarked once he heard the front door close.

"Abed, knock it off," Annie chastized. "This isn't a novel. Type in the password and let's go."

Dutifully, Troy and Abed confirmed the password’s success and then got to work checking Britta's browsing history.

Annie stayed on the other side of the room. Her fingers dragged over the cover of one of her favorite albums. She’d never even heard of most of those artists until Britta had introduced her to them. Despite what had happened between them, Annie still had mostly good memories to look back on during their –

“Annie, stop being nostalgic and come look at what we found.”

“I’m not being _nostalgic_ , Abed. I was just wondering what I could sell off if she doesn’t come back for these,” Annie lied.

“Why does it not surprise me that she still uses Internet Explorer?” Troy asked to no one in particular. Daniel meowed excitedly behind them all and Troy mistakenly took that as the cat agreeing with his observation.

“Why does it not surprise me to find you all in my room and invading my right to privacy while I’m gone?” Britta asked. She dropped her duffle bag on the floor and folded her arms across her chest.

Abed wasn’t sure who screamed louder at Britta’s voice: Troy or Annie. But he was sure that Britta coming home like that had launched them into a sort of rom-com experience that he wasn’t yet prepared for. There _had_ to be a way to spin it into a film noir. And yet, one look at Annie's face, and the way she was looking at Britta, told him that would be an incredibly plausible route.


	10. Justice Jargoned Jauntily in the Jurisdiction

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Abed found a way to turn Britta's return into a film noir styled event. Consider this an interlude.

When the smoke cleared and the screaming stopped, the only numbers left standing were the survivors. Annie knew she was behind the eight-ball when Troy confessed that it was Annie’s idea to break into Britta’s laptop to find her whereabouts. The look Britta gave Annie was icy to say the least.

And Abed was one goose who knew all about saying the least amount possible. He stayed silent and observed the interaction, and then the subsequent week after. After careful sleuthing, he finally deduced that the entire relationship between Annie, Britta, and the reason she left, boiled down to a shirt.

“Holy crap, Abed. Is there a point to this incredibly styled and drawn out story?” Jeff asked while drafting a text to Shirley.

Abed adjusted his fedora and spoke low: “Listen up, hombre. This shirt is the key. Year one at Greendale, Shirley and Annie held a protest against violence in Guatemala and at this protest they sold shirts, you see? These shirts had a screen print of Chacata Panecos face on them. That day Annie wore a medium sized shirt tucked into high-waist brown pants -”

“I’m not even going to ask how you remember that. Do you still have my shirt, by the way? Because that was an excellent shirt.”

“Britta purchased a protest shirt that day as well. Hers was a small because her chest is much smaller than Annie’s,” Abed elaborated while simultaneously ignoring Jeff.

“Hadn’t noticed.”

“Britta has been walking around in a Chacata Panecos shirt for two days now and I had my suspicions that the shirt was hot. Lifted, you know; that it was _stolen_. So, I checked the size tag on Britta’s shirt while she slept on the couch and – Jeff, listen close – the evidence was overwhelmingly in favor of my theory,” Abed finished.

Jeff had his feet propped on the table and he looked disturbingly bored. After setting his phone down to give Abed his full attention, he cocked an eyebrow. “Let me guess,” Jeff started, “it’s a size medium.”

Abed leaned back in his seat and folded his arms across his chest. The brim of his hat casted a slight shadow across his eyes. “The shirt Britta has been wearing is _Annie’s_ shirt,” Abed responded. “The only question is why.”

A mane of tousled blonde hair appeared over the edge of the couch and a groggy Britta sat up. With squinted eyes, Britta stared hard at Jeff and Abed. “Were you guys talking about me?” she asked. Her scratchy voice made Jeff shift in his seat. Luckily for Abed, Britta could sleep through a shelf of glasses being knocked over and shattering across the kitchen floor while being accompanied by shrieking cats that Jeff swore were trying to harmonize together. Long mental story short - God, he was starting to sound like Abed - Jeff assumed Britta heard none of the story. She probably would've Britta'd eavesdropping anyway.

“Not at all, doll,” Abed answered.

And so the sun set quietly that night over an ominous apartment. Britta was back for good and it had thrown them all into a quiet chaos. Everyone was walking on eggshells, and Abed knew it was up to him – and him alone – to bust this sting: The argument, Britta leaving, Annie’s weird behavior, the “216” in Britta’s computer password, and now the shirt.

It would all come down to the shirt.


End file.
